HEAD GAMES

The Steve Martin and Queen Latifah comedy Bringing Down the House, the top movie for three straight weekends, held the runner-up slot with $12.5 million.

The Core, starring Aaron Eckhart and Hilary Swank, opened in third place with $12.4 million. Debuting at No. 4 was the John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson military thriller Basic, with $12.1 million.

The war might be steering audiences more toward comedies, which account for six of the year's 10 top-grossing movies.

Chicago, last weekend's six-time Academy Awards winner including best picture, rode its Oscar triumph to a $7.4 million weekend, up 20% from a week earlier, giving it a three-month total of $144.9 million.

In limited release, Robert Duvall's Assassination Tango debuted with a solid $64,000 in seven theaters. Along with starring, Duvall wrote and directed the film.

Overall box-office continued to slump, as the top 12 movies grossed $87.3 million, down 24% compared to the same weekend a year ago, when Panic Room had a big $30 million opening and Ice Age remained a strong holdover.

The box office is expected to rebound as big summer flicks start arriving. The Adam Sandler-Jack Nicholson comedy Anger Management warms things up in mid-April, followed by the May debuts of the sequel X2 and The Matrix Reloaded.